CYPMHS stands for Child and Young People's Mental Health Service. It's a service for children and young people under 18 and their families and it's part of the NHS.
You may also see the term children and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) used. This is an older term for the main specialist NHS community service within the wider CYPMHS. CYPMHS is a specialist mental health service for children and young people. Our staff are highly trained in a range of different assessment techniques and evidence based therapies. Staff work closely in teams so that we can offer services tailored to the needs of the children, young people and families we see.
First Appointments
Risk Assessments: All children, young people and families that come to Leeds CYPMHS are required to have a risk assessment.
A risk assessment is a helpful tool for children, young people, families and staff to identify areas which may require some additional support.
In Leeds CYPMHS, a risk assessment is talked about in your first appointment. The CYPMHS clinician may ask some specific questions so they can understand if there are any concerns that you may need help with. The questions they ask may include “Do you have thoughts of self-harm or suicide?” or “Are you aggressive towards other people?” They may also ask your parents/carers questions. Be as honest as you can. We’re not here to judge you; we are here to help you.
The answers you give may lead to the CYPMHS clinician suggesting that others need to be involved in your care. This may be a CYPMHS Doctor or someone else such as a teacher at school.
If there are risks that you need help with, then together we will complete a plan called an ‘Our Plan’. This will give helpful hints and tips on how best to manage your worries and provide you with contact numbers / web pages for other services that can help.
Further Assessment and Therapy
If you need more help from CYPMHS following these sessions, we will plan together a package of care to suit you. Because we fit it around what you need, there is no one next step, but you will get a say in deciding what comes next.
Some options are:
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Specialist assessment: Examples of some of the specialist assessments we carry out are assessments for ADHD, eating disorders and Autistic Spectrum Conditions (ASC).
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Therapy: Examples of some of the specialist therapies we offer are cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), family therapy and creative therapies.
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Your therapist will talk through the options with you and what they think will work best for you.
Our service also includes a specialist team for children with learning disabilities and their families- services are tailored to take into account their specific needs.
Intensive assessment and treatment packages
For a very small number of young people, highly intensive assessment and treatment packages are needed. Children and young people offered this will usually have had significant previous input from within our service.
Leeds CYPMHS has an intensive outreach service and access to the West Yorkshire adolescent in-patient service.
CYPMHS nurses are also based in the Leeds YOTs (Youth Offending Teams).
Feeling comfortable and being able to talk freely is important. We will check with you what information we can share and who with. There are sometimes situations where we must share information (for example if someone was in danger). We would try to discuss this with you first. Any records we keep about you or your sessions are stored very securely.
To make sure we offer the best quality care we check how well we are doing. To do this we collect and analyse information. This is done within our organisation and nationally (to see how we compare to CAMHS services in other areas).
You can find out more about what happens to your information on the NHS Digital website.
